A number of industrial applications including, but not limited to, medical devices, communication devices, and navigation systems, as well as scientific areas such as physics and chemistry can benefit from magnetic detection and imaging. Many advanced magnetic imaging systems can operate in limited conditions, for example, high vacuum and/or cryogenic temperatures, which can make them inapplicable for imaging applications that require ambient conditions. Furthermore, small size, weight and power (SWAP) magnetic sensors of moderate sensitivity, vector accuracy, and bandwidth are valuable in many applications.
Atomic-sized nitrogen vacancy (NV) centers in diamond lattices have been shown to have excellent sensitivity for magnetic field measurement and enable fabrication of small magnetic sensors that can readily replace existing-technology (e.g., Hall-effect, SERF, SQUID) systems and devices. The sensing capabilities of diamond NV center sensors are maintained in room temperature and atmospheric pressure and these sensors can be even used in liquid environments (e.g., for biological imaging). Measurement of 3-D vector magnetic fields via diamond NV sensing may be beneficial across a very broad range of applications including communications, geological sensing, navigation, and attitude determination.
Currently, methods to measure the full 3-D vector of an external magnetic field are cumbersome and time-consuming. For example, such methods require the use of multiple sensors, each dedicated to measuring one direction of the 3-D vector, which are combined to determine the full magnetic field vector. Other methods utilize a single sensor dedicated to measuring one direction of the magnetic field vector at a time, thereby increasing the time required to determine the full magnetic field vector.